I did this unit with my daughter last school year (3rd grade). While most of the geography units we did were repeats of the ones I had done 3 years earlier with my son, a few of them were new (including this one). Last year, we did our geography scheduling differently. Instead of 2-week units, we did 3 days a week for 4 weeks. Rather than write out our schedule in this post, I’ll just list everything we did for our Iraq studies.
We began by locating Iraq on our world map and globe, and we found its capital (Baghdad) and largest cities in an atlas. Then she pasted the flag in her passport and date-stamped it.
We listened to the “Middle East Song” (Geography Songs).
We began reading selections from Bold Believers in Iraq (Kids of Courage—you can download this book for free if you register). This Christian resource gives lots of fun facts about Iraq, some activities to do, and stories of Christian children in Iraq.
She labeled a map of Iraq (Enchanted Learning map outline) and watched some videos on YouTube (here’s one we watched).
She colored the flag of Iraq, and we discussed Iraq’s history, government, culture, currency, languages, and religion.
We learned about ziggurats: Mesopotamia: Ziggurats
We discussed some important things that came from Iraq: the wheel, writing, law, time divisions, recorded history, schools, an accurate calendar, and maps.
We read about deserts, mountains, marshes, rivers, plains, and deltas in the book Geography from A to Z.
Using YouTube, we watched videos on Iraqi music and sandstorms.
We discussed Biblical places in Iraq (Babylon, Ur, Nimrud, Nineveh) and their history.
We played an Iraqi game mentioned in Bold Believers.
She worked on her notebook page (Country Fact Sheet from Homeschool Creations) and prayed for Iraq.
See these resources for more on Iraq:
National Geographic Kids: Iraq
I'm linking this post to "History and Geography" hosted this month by Adventures in Mommydom.
